Important Things I learned at the Writing Conference

-- Never put your purse on the floor. -- There wasn't a gross reason for this like something crawled in it or got spilled on it, or even because the Oprah show did a test to see how many germs were on a purse that a woman routinely set on the floor. No, this is because a large woman moved her purse from an empty chair so I could sit down, and she set the purse on the table. "I'm sorry, I just can't put my purse on the floor. I know it's a superstition." I'd never heard the superstition, so she repeated it for me. "Don't put your purse on the floor or you'll go broke." Fair enough. My purse will be elevated, as will my bank account from now on.
-- My husband and I fight because we talk man speak/woman speak. See, this I actually learned in a writing seminar. The speaker's goal was to teach us the difference between the way a man talks and a woman talks. Now I understand why my husband says, "Just tell me what you want me to do!" while I'm carefully laying out all the facts and stating my case. "Well, it was really early when we ate breakfast." "I think there's a nice restaurant not too far from here." I guess what I'm supposed to say is: "I'm starving. Let's stop at the restaurant down the road." Funny, cause I think of myself as being fairly direct.
--The poet laureate is a woman named Kay. Anyone who thinks otherwise should be gently corrected.
-- Writing conferences briefly inspire people to start writing groups, but someone must be willing to follow that up and organize them. Maybe we should invite some business-type people to writing conferences so they can be in charge of follow through.